"If any man (thinking I ſpeake this to enflame him for the vent of the Impreſſion) be of another opinion, I ſhall as willingly ſpare his money as his judgement. I cannot looſe ſo much by him as hee will by himſelfe. For I ſhall ſatiſfie my ſelfe with the conſcience of well doing, in making ſo much good common.
"Howſoeuer it may appeare to you, it ſhall ſuffice me to enforme you that it hath the beſt warrant that can bee, publique authority and private friends."
The younger Donne's petition is supported by the appearance of the book itself, which was edited in a very careless fashion, without any attempt at order or relation. But, on the other hand, as Mr. Edmund Gosse has pointed out, Marriott and his edition really do seem to have had the support of the best men among Donne's disciples and friends: King, Hyde, Thomas Browne, Richard Corbet, Henry Valentine, Izaak Walton, Thomas Carew, Jasper Mayne, Richard Brathwaite and Endymion Porter, all of whom, beside several others, combined to write the Elegies mentioned on the title-page.
The printer, "M. F.," was Miles Flesher, or Fletcher, successor to George Eld, and one of the twenty master printers who worked during this most troublous period, following the famous act of July 11, 1637. He also printed for Marriott the second edition of 1635 in octavo, and the third of 1639, which, in the matter of contents, is practically the same as the second.
Marriott's first reference in the lines of the "Hexaſtichon Bibliopolæ" which follows "The Printer To The Understanders,"
"I See in his laſt preach'd, and printed booke,
His Picture in a ſheete; in Pauls I looke,
And ſee his Statue in a ſheete of ſtone,
And ſure his body in the graue hath one: